environment

All those big oil and gas supporters must be feeling threatened. On Thursday, Al Gore issued a challenge for America to produce 100 percent of its electricity from renewable energy and carbon-free sources within the next 10 years, and repeated the challenge again at Netroots Nation over the weekend. more »

It's not news that "clean coal" isn't, well, clean. But clean coal made the news today not for environmental reasons but for financial ones when the New York Power Authority scrapped its plans for the Huntley plant, a "clean coal" facility in western New York State. more »

It's been an item of debate in D.C. circles for some time: who was really the worst head of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency?

Was it Anne Gorsuch Burford, who resigned from the EPA in disgrace after being cited for contempt of Congress?
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A3418-2004Jul21.html more »

Despite an infuriatingly recalcitrant EPA chief and an administration that has suppressed major climate change research for the last four years, global warming is once again at the top of the nation’s policy agenda. more »

As promised late last week, the New York Times magazine published an article of mine that explores a little-noticed populist uprising here in the Mountain West - one around the oil and gas drilling boom. more »

By an overwhelming bipartisan margin, Congress has passed what sponsors are calling the first civil rights act of the 21st century: the Genetic Information Nondiscrimination Act. The Act, which President Bush is expected to sign, prohibits employers and insurance companies from denying people jobs, benefits, or health coverage because of their genetic make-up. more »

A brand new Gallup poll reports:

“Americans prioritize protecting the environment over economic growth by 49% to 42% -- but this seven-point margin is near the low of the past couple of decades.”

This simple, perhaps disappointing poll, hides as much as it reveals. more »